Monday, 9 April 2012

This was a fictitious engagement played at the Dumbarton Wargames Club between Mother Russia's finest and the forces of Prussia's King Frederick. The two forces consisted of an infantry brigade, a cavalry brigade and a couple of guns. There was no particular objective as the emphasis was on learning the rules, which were Blackpowder.

The two sides lined up with the Prussians adopting a classic deployment, infantry centre with the cavalry and light troops on the flanks. The Russians placed all their cavalry on one flank while massing their infantry just off centre artillery in between.

The game started with a mad capped cavalry charge by the Prussian Cuirassier regiment. The Russian horse responded with a counter charge in the ensuing melee they beat their Prussian counter parts and persued after them. The Prussians managed to rally some what and force a draw the resulting bounce backs left the prussians off table and the russian horse collecting their wits.

The Russian infantry commander not too interested in what the donkey wallopers were up to began pressing forward. Being an inexperienced player our Prussian commander launched his hussars in an up the gut charge. Racing forward in their fancy blue uniforms it all looked so irresistible, well it wasn't one well delivered volley and the shattered hussars fled to safety.

A rather worried looking Prussian commander started looking around for troops to slow the Russian juggernaut down. He pulled an infantry battalion out of line to try and back up the floundering Hussars. The Juggernaut was not to be stopped, the battalion lasted two rounds of fire before breaking. The Russians rolled on sliding one Battalion off the flank to protect the move. A charge by the Russian horse and it would all be over.

The cavalry commander was obviously waiting for a better opportunity or something as he was not inclined to move. Things looked even bleaker for the battalion then one of the supporting Battalions rushed up to cover its flank from said cavalry broke and fled under artillery fire.

The Russians closed in bringing overwhelming fire power to bear it all looked up for the Prussians. This battalion was made of sterner stuff than her sisters and refused to break dishing out a bit in return.

The Russian flank battalion was now taking a pasting from artillery and the hussars were hovering to charge in. With his cavalry commander seemingly stuck in mud the Russian commander was beginning to wonder if it was all going wrong.
The infantry command final lost patience with the cavalry and charge in with his two lead battalions. The dice were rolled and that doughty Prussian battalion held much to the consternation of our Russian commander. After a second round of fighting finally the Prussians were pushed back.

This time lapse had been disastrous for the Russians. The battalion facing the gun had broken and fled while those hussars had rallied up and swept round the back and caught another battalion and wiped them out.

While the Prussian commander generously coincided the field to the Russians our Russian commander was now not so sure.